Chicken Tortilla Soup

I love slow cooker recipes - throwing everything in one big pot and then forgetting about it is a wonderful thing sometimes! This soup is really flavorful without being super spicy. My kids love it, so that's a big plus! I adapted the recipe from this one which was a good starting point but tasted bland to us, and wasn't very filling.

Chicken Tortilla Soup

1 small onion, chopped
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 red pepper, seeded and chopped
1 green pepper, seeded and chopped
2 cans diced tomatoes
1 (32 ounce) carton chicken broth
1 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
2 teaspoons chili powder
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breasts

Combine all ingredients in a slow cooker. Cook on low for 6 hours. Remove the chicken, shred or chop it, then return it to the slow cooker along with:

1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
1 can whole kernel corn
2 cups prepared (already cooked) rice

Let it continue to heat on low for 1-2 more hours, then serve with your choice of toppings (my favorite part!):

Chopped cilantro
Shredded cheese
Sour cream
Tortilla chips
Chopped fresh tomatoes
Chopped green onions
Whatever you like!

Now, that's the official recipe. Since my family is picky, I actually take more time to prep the ingredients by sauteéing the vegetables (first 5 ingredients) in a touch of olive oil until they're tender, then I blitz them in the food processor/blender and add them in like that. You can turn up the heat by adding in jalapeño, and you can certainly use a mix of different peppers like orange or yellow, too. If you're going low-carb, simply omit the rice and/or corn and add in another can of beans.

Sunday Night Review, 2-17

It's not easy coming up with recipes that suit a variety of tastes every week. It's tough enough with my own family, but when I add in our college ministry on Sunday nights it gets really complicated! I think if I took a poll, the hands-down favorite would have to be Calzones. They also love spaghetti - and last night's dinner kind of combined the two.

I don't think it's any exaggeration to say that Pizza Pasta Casserole is in the running for new favorite! When they go back for seconds and thirds, and you hear words like "awesome" being tossed around, you know it's a winner. I adapted the original recipe quite a bit, but since this is a pretty adaptable recipe so it worked well. I used ground beef, pepperoni and ham, and I made my own marinara sauce instead of using store bought. There is NO way the recipe as written would fit in a 9x13x3 pan as the author suggests. I cut back on amounts and still had to use a 9x13 and an 8x8.

I often make a big batch of marinara sauce - some to use and some to freeze for later. It doesn't have to always be such a process, though. If I don't have any sauce in the freezer, I simply pour a couple of cans of diced tomatoes (usually Hunt's Basil, Garlic and Oregano along with Spicy Red Pepper) into the blender with a chunk of raw onion, a couple of cloves of garlic, rosemary, parsley, salt and pepper. This is pretty much my go-to for anytime I need sauce for casseroles or dipping, or whatever.

Anyway, for dessert last night I made Homemade Peanut Butter Cups. They were VERY easy to make, though I suspect if my toddler had been "helping" and not at Nannie's for the day they wouldn't have been quite so effortless! I highly recommend these. I made them in mini muffin cups and used two bags of semi-sweet chocolate chips - one for the bottom layer, one for the top, plus the peanut butter mixture from the recipe. I got 46 total mini cups from that recipe.

Sunday Night Review 8/5/2012

Last night, for our Sunday night crowd, I made a big batch of beef burritos. I ended up with 20 and every one of them got eaten! There was actually one lone burrito left in the pan when one of our college guys came from UGA Redcoat Band practice - late and hungry! He gladly cleaned the pan out for me. I served them with sour cream, lettuce, diced tomatoes, and salsa, plus tortilla chips. For the salsa, I used jarred, medium heat and blended in a bit of lime juice and cilantro. For dessert, I made Nutella Doughnuts. They were okay, but really need to be made and eaten on the same day. (I baked them Saturday night and filled them Sunday afternoon.)

Though when I make Burrito Casserole for the family I use this basic recipe, I have to stretch it for the crowd on Sundays. This time I used 2 pounds of (lean) beef, onion, garlic, chili peppers (from a friend's garden), chili powder, cumin, pepper, salt, cilantro, vegetarian refried beans, and a can of diced tomatoes with green chilies (Ro-Tel). Served over rice with the above-mentioned toppings, they made a pretty hearty meal!

Rice in the pans, cilantro, enchilada sauce, beef feeling, cheddar and pepper-jack cheese, and flour tortillas.

Spaghetti and Meatball Cupcakes

When I saw a picture on Pinterest of cupcakes topped with spaghetti and meatballs, I knew I'd be making them soon! I love making cupcakes for when I need a dessert for a crowd. It's fun to fix them up in different ways. As usual, I used a boxed mix for the cakes themselves, though I always doctor it up a bit. I made cream cheese frosting to top the cakes.

You can see here I've already piped on the "noodles". After applying a thin "base coat" of frosting on the cakes, I tinted the rest with a touch of yellow food coloring, and added a bit of cinnamon to give it a slightly browner tinge, plus it adds flecks.

Now for the "marinara sauce" - strawberry jam.

The "meatballs" - Whoppers, of course! And no Italian dish is quite complete without a little "Parmesan cheese" - grated white chocolate.

Barbecued Chicken Legs

Last Friday I was in the produce department of Kroger when a thought hit me: I hadn't decided what to make for our college people on Sunday night! After some serious brainstorming and a check in the meat department for sales, I decided on trying my hand at barbecued chicken legs. I ended up getting 15 drumsticks for about $4.50! I decided to make my own barbecue sauce with whatever I had on hand. This recipe will work for any amount of chicken, though.

Barbecued Chicken Legs

chicken legs
lemon-pepper seasoning
garlic salt

Remove the skin from the drumsticks. This is the most time consuming part of the process, and many stores sell them already skinned - especially during grilling season. Lay the legs out on a foil-lined cookie sheet. Sprinkle them lightly with the two seasonings, flip 'em over and season that side, too. Roast them in the oven at 375° for 30 minutes, turn, roast 15 minutes more. During the last 15 minutes, baste them occasionally with the barbecue sauce. Serve with more sauce on the side for dipping.

Red-Eye BBQ Sauce

1 cup brewed coffee
1/2 cup salsa
1/2 cup ketchup
1/3 cup honey
1/3 cup apple-cider vinegar
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Combine all in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil; reduce heat and simmer for 30-35 minutes (while chicken bakes). Store leftover sauce in the refrigerator.

Since I was feeding a crowd and we eat after the evening church service, I elected to finish these off in the slow cooker. After the roasting process, without basting them, I put the drumsticks in my slow cooker insert and poured the completed Red-Eye BBQ Sauce over them. The insert went into the fridge until the next day, when I set the slow cooker to low before going to church that evening. They heated for about 3 hours, which was perfect! Enough to heat them through, but not to cook them any further.

Strawberry Shortcake

I wasn't feeling 100% this weekend, so I took the easy route for dessert Sunday night. I usually make my own cake and whipped cream for Strawberry Shortcake, but I sent Handsome to the store instead this time!

Strawberry Shortcake

16 ounces fresh strawberries
1 small orange
2 tablespoons powdered sugar

Wash and hull strawberries; slice and place in a small bowl. Zest and juice the orange; add those to the strawberries. Stir in the powdered sugar. You may not need the full amount of sugar, if any at all! The sugar does help pull out the juices, though, which is optimal for strawberry shortcake.

For the super-easy version of this dessert, just use storebought:

dessert shells
whipped cream (frozen and thawed, or the kind in the can)

Then you simply layer the shells, berries and cream.

For a simple way to make your own whipped cream, check out my Cinnamon Cream Fruit Dip. For a plain version just use powdered instead of brown sugar, and omit the cinnamon.

Baked Potato Casserole

I've seen lots of different versions of this, but when I made it this time I didn't bother to use a recipe. I just tossed things together until they looked good! Apparently it worked because our folks cleaned out the pans and I got lots of positive feedback! I'm giving you the recipe as I made it, but of course you can cut it in half for a more reasonable amount.

Baked Potato Casserole

3 pounds red potatoes
10 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled - reserve 1/4 cup drippings
3 green onions, sliced
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
1 cup sour cream
1/2 cup butter, melted
salt and pepper

Bake the potatoes until tender. (I just scrub them and pop them in the oven. They took about an hour at 400°.)

When the potatoes are cool enough to work with, cube them into bite-size pieces and divided them between two 9 x 13 pans. Sprinkle them with salt and pepper, onions, bacon, and cheese. Pour on the butter, bacon grease, and sour cream (divide it between the two pans). Carefully stir the potatoes until well coated. Cover with aluminum foil and bake at 350° for 20 minutes. Remove foil and bake for another 10 minutes. I served them with more sour cream on the side for those that wanted it.

If you want to make this dish in shifts, you can bake the potatoes the day before and store them in the fridge whole. I wouldn't keep them longer than 24 hours like that, though, as the texture will not be as good.

Sunday Night Pizza

Last night I made a few homemade pizzas for our crew.

On the left is BBQ Bacon Cheeseburger (BBQ sauce, beef, bacon, colby-jack, mozzarella); in the middle is Spaghetti and Meatball (marinara, angel hair pasta, meatballs, mozzarella, Parmesan); and on the right is Supreme (marinara, mushroom, onion, green pepper, ham, Italian sausage, pepperoni, colby-jack, mozzarella).

Our Oldest Girl made beautifully illustrated signs for the pizzas so people would know what was on each one.

For dessert we had a crowd favorite - Tiramisu!

Beef Pot Pie

This feels like a cheat recipe because it's really just a combination of another couple of recipes. It's what I served to our Sunday night crowd last night, and judging by the comments and the fact that there was only one serving left over ... they loved it! Technically, I used a venison roast, but a beef chuck roast would work just as well. If I were making this for my family, I would probably use leftovers from a roast, but considering the amount of people I cooked for last night I made the roast specifically for the purpose of pot pie.

You'll start with a pot roast: Sunday Pot Roast

Chop the leftover roast into bite-size pieces and stir it back into the gravy; set aside.

1 cup diced potatoes
1 cup diced carrots
1/2 cup chopped green beans or peas
2 cups beef broth
2 cups water
1/2 can whole kernel corn
1 tablespoon chopped rosemary
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper

Cook the potatoes and carrots in the beef broth/water until tender, about 10-12 minutes. Add in the green beans or peas in the last 2-3 minutes of cooking time. Drain the broth, reserving about a cup to add into the gravy. Combine the vegetables, reserved broth, corn, beef and gravy, and seasonings. Transfer to a greased 9x13 baking pan. Mix together topping ingredients and spread over the top.

1 cup melted butter
1 cup buttermilk
2 cups self-rising flour

Bake at 375° for 35-40 minutes, or until the topping is golden brown.

The good part about this is that if you don't have a large family, you can just use leftovers from the whole pot roast dinner - veggies and all. Combine everything and bake it in a 9-inch square dish, using 1/2 the topping ingredients. When I made this last night, I used the roast to make both a square pan and a 9x13.

Picnic Supper

For our college people last night I made a pretty traditional picnic meal, and it was easy as pie!

Hotdogs - I like turkey hotdogs, and I ate mine wrapped in a slice of cheese and dipped in a mix of ketchup and mustard - no bun. I don't have a grill, so I boil the hotdogs in a small amount of water in a large skillet. When they're nice and plump I drain off the water and add a touch of canola oil to the skillet. I sauté them until they're crispy.

The slow-cooked macaroni and cheese recipe is my standard for a crowd.

I used Alton Brown's method of "hard-boiled" eggs for these - baked in the oven! The only change I'd make is to cook them for less time. The recipe says 30 minutes, I took mine out at 28, and I could have probably done 25 instead. For the filling, I mix the yolks with a touch of Dijon mustard, mayonnaise, salt and pepper. Bonus tip for peeling eggs - the large end of the egg usually contains water, so crack that first, allowing the water to drain down into the egg, loosening the shell. After creating a small opening there, I use a small spoon to slide the shell right off! I can typically do it in two pieces. It's a fun challenge for someone who is easily amused.

Dessert was my mom's "Secret Recipe" Chocolate Chip Cookies. The quotes are because the recipe is available in my cookbook, and isn't a secret anymore! But for years people asked my mom for the secret to why her cookies were so tender and delicious - now you can know!

Strawberry Fudge Cake

I'm not much for baking cakes because something always seems to go wrong! When it's time to make a birthday cake I generally just go for a boxed mix - although I do make my own frosting from scratch. Our Little One turns 2 on Friday, so continuing a new tradition I planned to make a cake to share on Sunday night. After some thought and a strong desire not to make another trip to the grocery store for a cake mix, I chose to get creative with this cake. I adapted a basic chocolate cake recipe from Hershey, and added a special twist to traditional cream cheese frosting. This cake was absolutely divine! I don't even care for sweets and I had a piece for breakfast this morning! I asked my kids what it should be called and our Oldest Girl said, "Fudge Strawberry Awesomeness!" But I think I'll call it ...


Strawberry Fudge Cake

1 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup cocoa
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup boiling coffee

Heat oven to 350°. Grease and flour two 9-inch round baking pans. In a mixing bowl, combine dry ingredients. Add eggs, buttermilk, oil, and vanilla; beat on medium speed until smooth. Stir in coffee. (Batter will be thin.) Pour batter evenly into prepared pans. Bake 30-35 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted near center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes; remove from pans onto wire racks.

Meanwhile, in a small microwaveable bowl, melt together:

6 squares white baking chocolate
1/2 tablespoon butter

(Use 50% power in 30 second increments, stirring between heating.)

While cake layers are still warm, spread the chocolate evenly over each layer. Allow the layers and chocolate to cool completely.

Cake layer with the white chocolate spread over it.

Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting

1/2 cup butter, softened
8 oz. reduced-fat cream cheese
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
5-6 cups confectioners' sugar
1/3 cup strawberry preserves

In a mixing bowl, combine butter, cream cheese, extracts and half of the confectioners' sugar. Mix until smooth, then add in the preserves and continue adding the sugar by the 1/2 cup until the desired consistency is reached. If the preserves don't make the frosting as pink as you'd like, you can add a drop of red food coloring. 

Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting

Spread a layer of frosting over the bottom layer of your cake, then top with second layer and frost the top and sides. Store the cake in the refrigerator.

Honey-Wheat Yeast Rolls

I have a stand-by roll recipe I use when I'm making them for a crowd, and one I use when I'm just making them for the family. The recipe I'm sharing today makes about 36 rolls and when I make them for our Sunday night crowd there are typically just enough left over for Handsome to take to work for a snack the next day. Last night we had 3 left! They also polished off 2 slow cookers full of potato soup, but that's another post for another day! Anyway, I adapted the recipe from Taste of Home and I thought it was about time I wrote down how I actually do it instead of adjusting the recipe in my head every time.


Honey-Wheat Yeast Rolls

2 packages (1/4 ounce each) active dry yeast, (4-1/2 teaspoons)
2 cups warm water (110° to 115°) 
1/2 cup honey
1 egg 
1/4 cup canola oil 
2 teaspoons kosher salt 
3 cups whole wheat flour
3 to 3-1/2 cups all-purpose flour

In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in warm water. Add the honey, egg, oil, salt, 1 cup bread flour and 3 cups wheat flour. Beat until smooth. Stir in enough remaining flour to form a soft dough. You don't want it to be sticky, but too much flour will make the rolls dense. Start slowly (1/2 cup at a time) and don't forget that you're adding more flour when you knead the dough, and they'll be on a floured surface when you shape the rolls, too.

Turn onto a floured surface; knead until smooth and elastic, about 3-4 minutes. Place in a greased bowl, turning once to grease the top. Cover and let rise in a warm place until doubled, about 1 hour.  

Turn the dough onto a lightly floured surface. I use a sharp knife to cut the dough into four portions, then eight. Each of those portions I just cut into "roll-size" blobs. You can roll them neatly into balls by cupping them in your palm; use the blobs as-is; or shape each blob into a rope, then tie it in a knot and tuck the ends underneath. However you do it, place them on a greased baking sheet. I like my rolls soft, so I place them with sides touching. Cover with plastic wrap sprayed with non-stick spray (or a kitchen towel) and let rise until doubled, about 30 minutes.  

Bake at 350° for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from pans to wire racks to cool. I usually get about 3 dozen rolls out of this dough.

Maple Bacon Cupcakes

This seems to be such a popular combination of flavors these days! After tasting it, it's not hard to see why. In my opinion it tastes like Saturday morning breakfast - just eat one with a cup of coffee! For you skeptics out there, they really do taste like pancakes with syrup, and bacon on the side. I asked our college people what they thought and I got really good reviews - and a lot of surprise that they were actually tasty! Try 'em today!

Maple Bacon Cupcakes:
  
1/3 cup butter, softened 
1/3 cup bacon fat, firm (refrigerated)
1-1/2 cups brown sugar 
2 eggs 
1 teaspoon maple extract 
2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour 
2-1/2 teaspoons baking powder 
1/2 teaspoon salt 
1 cup milk
6 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled 

 In a large bowl, cream butter, bacon fat and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in maple. Combine the flour, baking powder and salt; add to the creamed mixture alternately with milk. Fold in bacon pieces. (Do not over-mix.) Fill paper-lined muffin cups three-fourths full. Bake at 350° for 18-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pans to wire racks to cool completely. Frost cupcakes. Yield: 18 cupcakes

Maple Bacon Frosting:

5 tablespoons butter, softened
3 tablespoons bacon fat, firm (refrigerated)
4 cups powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon maple extract
3-4 tablespoons milk

In a bowl, cream butter and bacon fat. Beat in sugar and maple. Add in enough milk to reach your desired consistency.

Note: I definitely recommend using cupcake liners with these, and they're best served fresh. They have to be refrigerated, and in my opinion aren't as good cold. Bring them up to room temperature before serving if they've been refrigerated. 

Slow Cooked Chicken

I don't love housework, but I do love all the "mod cons" - as our friends across the pond call modern conveniences. There's something supremely satisfying about knowing the dishwasher, washing machine and dryer are all working away in the background while I'm busy with other things. I feel the same way about my slow cooker. Knowing that dinner is ready to go with little to no further effort on my part is comforting in a way. It's one less thing to concern myself with as we finish up other chores and work on school for the day. Other than for a meal, I also like to use my slow cooker for large batches of chicken. I buy it as it's on sale, then when I get a few packages I pull them out of the freezer and cook them all at one time. I wrote about that process in this post. I'll be doing that today! I'm cooking down about $5.00 worth of chicken which will translate to about 4 meals for our family. When I have it all packaged up, the shredded chicken will go in the freezer to await its fate in one of these recipes:

Chicken Parmesan Casserole

Thai Chicken Pasta

Chicken Ranch Casserole

Chicken Parmesan Calzones

Chicken Salad

Chicken Pot Pie

... Or any number of other fabulous options!

A special thanks goes out to our "college people", who blessed me with a new slow cooker last night! It's non-stick and stainless steel and programmable ... and I'm so excited! Thank you so much! We love y'all.

Sunday Night Review 10/2

Last night the menu was BBQ Chicken Sandwiches, Twice-Baked Potato Casserole, and Strawberry-Limeade Punch. The chicken was just a mix of light and dark meat mixed with Spicy Honey barbecue sauce and cooked in the slow cooker for several hours.

Twice-Baked Potato Casserole 

5 lb russet potatoes 
8 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled
8 oz cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted 
1 cup sour cream
1 green onion, chopped
1-1/2 cup cheddar cheese, grated
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper

Preheat oven to 350° degrees. Peel potatoes, and cut into chunks. Place in a large saucepan, and add enough cold water to cover by about 2 inches. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat, and reduce to a simmer. Cook until tender and easily pierced with a paring knife, about 20 minutes. Transfer to a colander to drain; return to pan.

Mash the potatoes in pan until light and fluffy. Add the cream cheese, butter, and sour cream, and stir until combined and smooth. Add the green onion, 1 cup cheddar cheese, half the bacon, salt, and pepper. Stir until well combined.

Transfer to a buttered 9 x 13 baking dish. Top with remaining 1/2 cup cheddar cheese. Bake until top is slightly golden and potatoes are heated through, about 30 minutes. Remove from oven; garnish with remaining bacon. Serve immediately.

Sunday Night Review 9/25

When feeding a crowd it's hard to go wrong with Mexican food. This week I made my Burrito Casserole, doubled, which made 16 burritos. I used ground turkey, which most College People view as healthy and therefore not as tasty as beef, but they loved it anyway, and hey, it's free food! I served rice on the side, and by some weird hiccup of the brain, I didn't make as much as I should have. But no one went hungry!

For dessert, I wrapped Hershey's Kisses in wonton wrappers, brushed them with butter and baked them for 10 minutes at 350°. After placing them on a serving tray, I dusted them with powdered sugar. Yummy, easy, and cheap since the Kisses were on sale ($1.50) and the wontons were leftover from another meal.

On a side note: Before leaving for church, I put the cold, covered casseroles in the oven and set the delayed start function so they'd bake and be ready when we got home. I neglected (another brain hiccup!) to set the "stop time" on the oven. I remembered that towards the end of a long (but engaging and challenging) sermon by a guest preacher. Quickly, I petitioned God to please save our dinner. Well, when we arrived home, the casseroles were still perfect, despite having been in the oven for an hour and fifteen minutes when it should have only been 30! God is good.

Sunday Night Review 9/11

I am a huge fan of warm weather! To me, the worst part of summer is how super-cooled people keep any given building. I dread that blast of air conditioning that hits after the warmth of the sun. But I know I'm mostly alone on that point, though Handsome shares my opinion, thankfully!

Despite my preference for summer, I do love fall for various reasons: the leaves changing color, the crisp (not cold!) air, the smell of burning leaves, marching band season, and the fact that fall is so perfect for comfort food like soups and stews. Last night for dinner I made two simple soups - Veggie Beef, and Cheesy Potato. Both were very simple to throw together, and turned out to be quite tasty, too! I made Honey-Wheat Yeast Rolls to go with the soups, and Autumn Cupcakes for dessert.


Cheesy Potato Soup

1 (30 ounce) package shredded hash browns
1 (10-3/4 ounce) can cream of chicken soup
6 cups chicken broth (1-1/2 cartons)
1/2 onion, chopped
8 ounces shredded cheddar cheese 
salt and pepper
8 ounces cream cheese (I used reduced-fat, but fat-free will NOT melt)

In a slow cooker, combine all ingredients except the cream cheese. Cook on low for 6 hours. Add in cream cheese, stirring and continuing to heat until melted, about 30 minutes to an hour.


(See, I told you it was easy!)

Cake Solutions- Trifle!

One thing I hate to do in the kitchen is to waste anything! It happens, but I truly do my best to make the most out of everything we have. It's amazing what little bits of food can be re-created into for future meals. One example is cake. Ever had a cake layer fall apart when you tried to remove it from the pan? Turn the mess into a trifle! Want a cake for your small family but don't need the amount that's in a two-layer? Freeze the second layer and make it into a trifle later. I don't make a lot of baked goods to have around the house. One reason is that we flat don't need it! But last week we had The Boy's birthday party. I just needed 4 cupcakes - one for each boy - and instead of trying to adapt a recipe to make a tiny amount like that I simply used a boxed cake mix and baked 'em all! I used what I needed for the party and rather than let the rest sit around for a few days, they went in the freezer. A week later, on Saturday night, they went into the fridge to slowly thaw. Sunday afternoon, I made them into a delicious trifle!

There's no real recipe involved here. You just break leftover cake/cupcakes (undecorated) into a trifle bowl, layer with prepared pudding, add more cake, more pudding, and top the whole thing off with whipped cream. My cupcakes were chocolate and I used white chocolate and chocolate fudge puddings (since I was making this for a crowd I used 2 packages of pudding), and also crumbled a Butterfinger candy bar into the layers, too.

Trifle is so easy to throw together since you can keep everything you need on hand. It's versatile since it's hard to go wrong combining cake and pudding. Fruits make a interesting addition, too. 

Sunday Night Review 8/21

Every once in a while, I love to make breakfast for supper. It's my favorite meal, mainly because it doesn't generally include any vegetables! It tends to be my go-to meal when the cupboards are otherwise bare. Of course, I much prefer to plan ahead and actually make a really good breakfast menu! That's what I did for this past Sunday night. I never know ahead of time how many "college people" are going to show up from week to week, and breakfast usually stretches pretty easily. We had the most people I think we've ever had this time, with 20! Add our kids into the mix, and you know we had a packed house.

Here's the menu:

Hashbrown Casserole
*Brown Sugar Bacon (one of the college guys has dubbed it THE Bacon and that name has stuck!)
Grits
*Scrambled Eggs
Sausage
Cinnamon Rolls (2 pans, 32 rolls. Half with pecans, half without.)
**Apple-Carrot Muffins (These were just leftover from a Saturday baking session.)

I figure everyone has a recipe for Hashbrown Casserole, but I'll share mine with you here, anyway! It's really simple, and one of my favorite dishes.

Hashbrown Casserole
1 package frozen Southern-style hashbrowns
1 can (10-3/4 oz.) cream of chicken soup
8 ounces sour cream
8 ounces shredded sharp cheddar cheese
4 tablespoons butter, melted
Salt and pepper to taste

Stir all ingredients together in a large bowl. Pour into a greased 9 x 13 baking dish. Bake at 350 for 45-50 minutes, until bubbly and cheese is completely melted.

* These recipes are in my cookbook, but I haven't shared them on the blog yet.
** I'll share this recipe soon, in another post.

Sunday Night Review 8/14

This Sunday night was special since it marked The Boy's seventh birthday. I wanted to make something he really likes, but that everyone else could enjoy, too. Almost immediately, I knew: Mexican food is always a sure bet with our crowd! Build-your-own tacos are a great option for a crowd, because everyone can serve themselves just what they like. Vegetarian, lactose-intolerant, low-carb ... there's something for everyone!

The menu is simple, with little actual cooking involved. I sauteed a couple of pounds of ground venison with onion and garlic, and seasoned it with cumin, red pepper flakes, chili powder, salt and pepper. Then I stirred in some salsa, a bit of beef broth, and a can of vegetarian refried beans. I also cooked up a pot of rice, using beef broth instead of water. Everything else just needed to be heated or chopped or diced! To top the flour tortillas, I provided lettuce, tomato, cheddar cheese, black beans, corn, and sour cream.

For dessert, I made a chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream frosting. It was VERY good! And what's birthday cake without ice cream? One of our guys works at Mayfield Dairy and he had given us a coupon for a free "half-gallon" (1.75 quarts these days!) of ice cream. We went with Cookies and Cream.